Life — January 21, 1886 — page 2: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

VOL, VII. JANUARY 21, 1886, NO. 160, 1155 Broapway, NEw York, Published every Thursday, $5 year in advance, postage free. Single copies, to cents, Back numbers can be had by applying to this ofhce. Vol. 1., 50 cents per number ; Vol. II., 25 cents per number; Vols. I1I,, IV. and V. at regular rates, Rejected contributions will be destroyed unless accompanied by a stamped and directed envelope. T is dreadful to learn from the newspaper despatches of the terrible suffering from the cold of the citizens of Rio Janeiro. The cold wave which struck that place on Satur- day last sent the thermometer down to 73°, and the cocoanut milk supply was completely destroyed. Further north, in Florida, there has likewise been much damage caused by the cold, and the unpleasant news comes to us that the orange crop is likely to prove a total failure this year unless the novelty-loving Northerner is willing to take an orange snowball in place of the usual run of juicy fruit. At present the outlook is exceedingly dark for fruiterers, as a supply of fruit which, when subjected to the melting in- fluences of the sun, will imitate the action of the skating pond and disappear ¢ foto cannot but make ruinous inroads into their profits. There is in all this, however, some compensation, and if the fruit dealers are alive to the opportunities all may not be lost. The ice dealers are complaining, as usual, that the ice yield this year is very poor. A word to the wise dealer in congealed oranges and cocoa- nuts should be sufficient. . . . *ABLE despatches convey to us the pleasing information that before the opening of Parliament last week a thorough search of the vaults beneath both the Houses was made, and no evidences of a Guy Fawkes plot were dis- covered. This must be reassuring to noble Lords and ignoble Com- moners alike. The feeling that one may be at any moment sent sailing into chaos, astride of a powder barrel which has propelled itself through the cellar ceiling. is anything but a pleasant one, and would, we should think, very materially interfere with the course of Government. At the same time it speaks ill for English methods that in these days of civili- zation the hair of the ignoble Commoner or the bald sub- stitute of the noble Lord should be agitated by any such fear. Be just and fear not is an old adage upon which English legislators might act with considerable profit. R. CYRUS W. FIELD is a most patriotic, unselfish gentleman. He is shortly to have the André Monument repaired. He evidently intends keeping that hardy little upstart, the American dynamiter, permanently in business, furnishing indirectly an unending source of sensation to the newspapers of our land, and giving the plodding American who still retains to a mild degree certain revolutionary ideas in regard to Great Britain a chance to show the mother country just what he thinks of her. If it were not for Mr. Field's persistent attempts to show the Aristocracy of the Earth how thoroughly imbued with love, veneration. and admiration for their manners and customs Americans are, the Aristocracy of the Earth would never have an opportunity to observe that the reverse is nearer the truth. It is rumored that Mr. Field has abandoned the shaft which he contemplated erecting to Benedict Arnold on the spot where this noble patriot handed over the estimates whereby the good but aberrant George III. could acquire title to his efforts in behalf of Independence. . . . HE Presbyterian pastors who recently convened to dis- cuss high license are so evidently desirous of the earth, judging from their demands, that the Sun has under- taken to rebuke them. Among other pertinent remarks our E. C. says: The measure also proposed in the original draft, which, so far as we know, has not been changed in that respect, to regulate exactly the manner in which the licensed dealer should keep his place of business. His saloon must be so arranged that every passer-by can see just what is going on inside, so that nobody can take a drink un- observed. The exposition of wares which other dealers make ip their windows is denied to the liquor seller, for the view through the panes must be unobstructed. This is a Yankee trick imported from Boston, and its purpose is to make men ashamed to go into a drinking place, the Boston theory being that taking a glass of liquor is a deed to be done only in the darkness. But it will not work in New York, where hypocrisy is not so common as it is under a Puritan dispensation, and where the people will not put themselves under rules based on the odious theory that they are afraid of each other. Mr. Dana has evidently been visiting a distinguished Massachusetts ex-candidate for the Presidency. . . . E commend to the attention of our readers the bill now before the State Legislature regulating the in- vestments by the Commissioners of the City’s Sinking Funds. The Funds are sinking so very fast that something should be done, and quickly, too, to invest them where they may not. entirely disappear from view. comicbooks.com